Africa Resilience Initiative

ASSOCIATED PRESS                                                                                     April 1, 2015

BALTIMORE — A Baltimore company and Maryland public health officials are announcing a smartphone and Web application for self-reporting possible Ebola symptoms.

Emocha Mobile Health Inc. said Wednesday that people returning from affected West African nations can use the app to report their temperature and any symptoms twice daily to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The federal government recommends such reporting for 21 days.

The state health agency has operated a call center since October for monitoring people known to have been in affected countries. The app eventually will link to the state's database of such individuals to automate the reporting of data to Maryland and federal authorities.

CENTER FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASE RESEARCH AND POLICY by Lisa Schnerring               March 31, 2015

The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced today that it has awarded BioCryst Pharmaceuticals a $12 million grant to continue development of BCX4430, a small-molecule drug designed to treat Ebola and other filovirus infections, and to prepare for large-scale manufacturing of the agent.

Studies in nonhuman primates suggest that the drug is effective against Ebola and Marburg viruses and could be useful as a broad-spectrum antiviral, the HHS said in a statement. BCX4430 is currently in phase 1 human trials, and if results show safety, it could be one of the treatments to be tested for efficacy in clinical trials.

BCX4430 is the first small-molecule Ebola treatment that BARDA has supported. Other Ebola products in development that have received BARDA funding include the monoclonal antibody cocktail ZMapp and three vaccines.
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http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2015/03/biocryst-gets-hhs-contract-ebola-drug-development

REUTERS   by Saliou Samb                              March 31, 2105

CONAKRY --Guinea has detected at least three new cases of Ebola in the alumina hub of Fria, according to the national coordination of the fight against the disease, as authorities blamed popular resistance for hampering the battle against the virus.

Fria is home to the only alumina smelter in the West African country, Friguia, which produced some 630,000 tonnes of alumina a year until it was shuttered by Russian aluminium giant RUSAL in 2012.

The report noted the refusal by the local population in Conakry to hand over two other suspected cases, despite the intervention of local authorities. It said families in the town of Coyah, 50 km ( miles) from Conakry had refused to follow contacts of an Ebola case.

The resistance of local communities, which refuse to admit the existence of the disease, has dogged efforts to eradicate Ebola in Guinea since it was detected in March 2014

Read complete story.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/31/us-health-ebola-guinea-idUSKBN0MR1TL20150331

FRONT PAGE AFRICA  by Stephen D. Kollie                                                       March 31, 2015

Monrovia - The Head of the Incident Management System (IMS), the command center responsible to oversee Liberia’s Ebola response, has clarified that contrary to several reports on social media, including Facebook and other sources, Liberia has no other confirmed Ebola case apart from a lady who tested positive for the virus but died last weekend.

“Since the 20th, we have one confirmed case. Unfortunately, the case has since died,” he said Monday. “No other confirmed cases since then as of this morning (March 30). I am not saying it will not be (a case)if it is tested positive. But the cases are being followed up, nobody is sick yet.”

Tolbert Nyenswah disclosed that out of 211 contacts that were being monitored by the Ministry of Health team, 26 contacts have been cleared while 185 contacts are still under surveillance. “We still are intensifying our normal contact tracing. We are investigating to see whether or not the people should remain on the contact list or it is fair enough to release them,” he said.